I woke up sometime late in the night. Well, not so late, really. Close to midnight, so hardly late at all. But the Vicodin had worn off and I hurt. I groaned as I turned over to sit up and came face-to-face with Damon, who was sitting in a chair beside my bed. At least I didn’t scream, though I did make a startled noise.
“What are you doing in here?” I demanded, a little too loudly. “Where are Lorraine, Stacey, and Jen?”
“Asleep. They won’t be waking up anytime soon, so we have time.”
I frowned. “Time for what? What did you do to them?”
“I made sure they’ll stay asleep for the next few hours, while I take you to get better.” He stood and reached out a hand to help me up. “Come on.”
I stared at his hand and shook my head. “I’m staying right here and healing up on my own.”
He sighed exasperatedly and planted his hands on his hips. “I just want to take you to your sanctuary and get you fixed up.”
I started shaking my head as soon as he said sanctuary. “I’m not going back there.” The feeling of the place had shattered, and going there would be too hard to handle at the moment.
“But it could help you,” he insisted.
“It’s broken.”
Deciding that making an exit would end this conversation, I stood and bit back my yelp as I hobbled around the end of the bed and to my bathroom. Inside, I found my medication bottles. I checked the prescription information then took what I was supposed to. I eyed my shower wishfully, but I wasn’t going to shower with Damon standing outside.
You were naked in his arms hardly more than twenty-four hours ago, I reminded myself. I flicked a glance at the mirror and instantly looked away. No reason for him to be interested in me now. I looked like Edward Scissorhands had attacked me. Stir in a patchwork of bruises, and I had all the appeal of rotten hamburger.
I waved a hand and the mirror fogged white. I didn’t need to see myself again anytime soon. I washed my hands and face then rebrushed my hair. I decided it was a good time to brush my teeth again, and so I did. When I couldn’t find any other reason to dawdle, I went back out to my bedroom. Ajax lay just outside the bathroom door. I nearly tripped over him. He gave me a how could you look as he rose and returned to my bed, flopping down in the middle.
Damon leaned against my bedroom door. Did he think I was going to make a run for it? I flipped on the light and went to sit on the end of my bed, eyeing him with unconcealed annoyance.
His arms were folded over his chest. They were nice. Tanned and muscular. Like the rest of him, at least, what I remembered of him in the pool. I hadn’t seen his legs, but his jeans couldn’t hide the slope and curve of his hard muscles.
“You could be a nude model,” I said without thinking.
“What?” His startled response made me want to laugh. He wasn’t the type who got thrown easily or often. It felt like an accomplishment to do it.
“You’re handsome. Spanking-hot body. I bet artists would love to sculpt and paint you. And you wouldn’t have to do anything but look good. Has to be a better gig than following me around.”
His lips threatened a smile. “You think I’ve got a ‘spanking-hot body’?”
I rolled me eyes. “Duh. I’m not blind. Jen, Stacey, and Lorraine would say the same. Plus, you seem to have a brain to go with the Norse god looks, which doesn’t really matter for being a nude model but is useful for interacting with other humans.”
“Thanks. I think.”
“Truth is truth. No point lying about it. Anyhow, it still doesn’t explain why you’re still here.”
“I’ve got a job.”
That’s when I figured out that he probably thought I needed to be on suicide watch. I might wake up and gnaw my wrists open or something equally dire. I practically grew sharp spikes all over me at the realization. He didn’t know crap about me, and he’d decided I’d be such a coward that I’d kill myself.
Ajax must have felt the change in me. He sat up and nudged his nose under my arm. I stroked his head. Damon needed to leave. My loft, my building, my life. He needed to get the fuck out.
I didn’t realize I’d said the words until he replied.
“Not going to happen.”
I looked at him. I was starting to shake. It took everything I had to keep the tremble out of my voice. This time I didn’t want to cry. I wanted to kill.
“I’ve had all I’m ever going to take of someone forcing me and torturing me. I will not let anybody else do that to me again. Not you, not your fucking employer, not God himself. Do you understand? I’m done.”
He flinched as if the words were bullets. Abruptly he thrust away from the door and stalked over to me. He crouched, grabbing my arms painfully and giving me a little shake. “What did your mother do to you?”
His reaction startled me and inflamed my anger. Hadn’t he paid attention to a word I’d said? I pushed his arms away. Or I tried. They were iron bars.
“What does it matter to you?”
His mouth worked. “It matters,” he said finally.
It made no sense, and I didn’t believe him. I lifted my knee and shoved my foot against his chest. Instead of letting go and falling back, he took me with him. I sprawled on top of him, crying out as pain slashed sharply across my stitched wounds. Ajax leaped down beside us, barking and snarling. He snapped at Damon, darting his head forward. The man beneath me twisted away.
“Don’t you dare hurt him,” I told Damon. With his magic, he could crush the dog. “Let me go!”
I tried to push off him, but it was like struggling with an iron octopus. His fingers dug into my hips, holding me fast against him. I lay between his legs, my chest on his. We were bumping uglies through our clothing, and I had to make myself not flush with embarrassment.
“What is wrong with you?” I demanded.
“God help me, you are,” he said and then one hand knotted in my hair, the other wrapped my back, though oddly gently as if he remembered I was hurt.
I was too stunned to do anything. He pulled me down until his lips touched mine. Despite his ragged breathing and the tight grip on my hair, his kiss was gentle. His mouth teased, his teeth nibbled. I should have fought him, but his kiss sent streaks of electricity through me, all the way to my toes.
I gasped at the shock of it, and he took advantage. He nudged my mouth wider and teased my tongue with his. I was still frozen in stunned surprise, and yet the heat in my belly had shifted from anger to something else. I tentatively slid the tip of my tongue over his lower lip. He made a pleased sound, and his hands moved to cup my cheeks, holding me as if I were delicate china.
I let it go on for long, delicious moments. Hell, who was I kidding? I reveled in it until some semblance of sanity returned and I pushed up against his chest. He let me pull away, his hands sliding down my body to rest on my hips. I shivered at the sensations that flickered through me. It was like skydiving over a live volcano. I felt his heat against me and the distinct hardness of arousal. I couldn’t help but feel both proud and a little bit awed that I excited him, even all Frankensteined up as I was.
I met his smoky gaze, and my stomach did a flip. Then as though he couldn’t resist, he tugged me down again. I closed my eyes so I could focus better on the feel of him, the smell of him, the taste. My head was starting to spin, and I couldn’t tell if it was him or the Vicodin kicking in.
I lifted my head again. I was breathing as if I’d just sprinted a half mile. Beside us, Ajax whined and nosed my face. I reached out and petted him. “It’s okay.”
I frowned down at Damon. I could feel his heart thundering against my palm. With one hand, he rubbed the back of my neck, and with the other, he pushed my hair away from my face so he could see me better.
“Why do you keep kissing me? Is this just a ploy to make me stop being mad at you and agree to meet your employer?”
That earned me grimace and then a rueful laugh. “Jesus. What’s there to understand? You fascinate me. I’m pulled to you like a fly to sugar, and dear lord, but you are scorching. I couldn’t stay away from you if I tried. I tried to tell you the other night when I busted up your meeting.”
I recognized the words, but they didn’t make any sense at all. I wasn’t the kind to inspire that kind of anything in any man. I was in the used goods business. I sold the possessions people didn’t want or couldn’t take with them wherever they went. I was about as ordinary as it got. I was definitely not fascinating. Plus, I looked like a quilt made by Hannibal Lecter.
“When was the last time you saw a psychiatrist? You might want to get an appointment. Like right now. You’re having a seizure or something. You should probably have checked in to the mental ward when you were at the hospital instead of visiting me.”
His chest jerked as he gave a quiet laugh. “You don’t believe me.”
“It’s not that I don’t believe you; it’s that you’re nuts. Though I’ve heard you should humor insane people. Otherwise they could get dangerous.”
He gave me a lazy smile. “Yes. Humor me. Definitely do that.”
He kissed me again. Thoroughly. By the time it ended, I was on fire and I could barely breathe.
“And you say I’m scorching.”
His smile was smug. “It’s good to know I’m not the only one who went up in flames.”
“This is weird. I think I must be asleep. Or hallucinating. Narcotics do that, right? This isn’t really happening.” I let out a long sigh of relief as my world righted itself again. “That makes more sense. You aren’t really here. You’re just a figment of my imagination.”
“The hell I am,” he growled and then proceeded to kiss me breathless again.
“Wow,” I said incredibly articulately when we came up for air.
“Do you still think I’m just a hallucination? I’ll kiss you all night if that’s what it takes for you to believe me. I want to be sure I get it through your thick head so I don’t have to convince you again tomorrow.” He smiled that lazy smile again, his gaze full of sensual promise as he rubbed his thumb over my swollen mouth. “Though I’m enjoying convincing you more than I can say.”
He sobered. “For the record, I don’t believe you tried to commit suicide. I did,” he said, when I opened my mouth to challenge him. “I forgot how crazy independent you are. Nobody else I know would have up and flung themselves out into a nightmare of a river to break a curse. It shouldn’t have worked. I don’t even know why it did. The idea that you thought it would was more incredible than the idea that you tried to suicide. But I realized I was wrong. Very wrong. You just aren’t the type to give up. You don’t have any quit in you.”
“And don’t forget it,” I said, somewhat mollified.
“That worries me too,” he said cryptically. “Now can we get up off the floor? I’ll take you to the sanctuary.”
The man was tenacious and relentless. Well, so was I. I shook my head. “No. It’s broken.”
He sighed. “It’s not. The buddha reset the protections.”
“It’s not the same.” I couldn’t explain that it wasn’t the magic that was gone. It was the sense that it was my space, that I could close it around me and find peace. Maybe I’d feel differently later but not now.
He studied my face. “Okay. The hard way it is.” He rolled me off him onto the floor and then got to his feet and helped me up. Ajax squeezed between us, still bristling.
“It’s okay,” I told him. “Damon’s not going to hurt me.” On the other hand, the river had done a hell of a job. My body was feeling achy, and pain flickered over me in little bursts. Rolling around on the floor with Damon hadn’t helped, but the kisses had been worth it. I had to admit that much.
“I need to go back to bed,” I said and then awkwardly hobbled around to crawl under the covers. Ajax hopped up beside me and nosed my face. I stroked him to reassure him that I was all right.
“He’s healing a lot faster than he should,” I said sleepily.
“He went into the pool when you disappeared. It appears to have done wonders for him.”
“I told you sos are so childish.”
“You only say that because you deserve it.”
I flipped him off and flopped over on my side, putting an arm over Ajax as he curled up against me. The last thing I heard as Damon turned off the light was his quiet laughter.